{"id":9155,"date":"2017-10-22T17:29:13","date_gmt":"2017-10-22T15:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/?p=9155"},"modified":"2017-12-06T20:43:53","modified_gmt":"2017-12-06T18:43:53","slug":"austria-commemoration-of-jewish-holocaust-events-in-situ-gains-momentum-and-enhance-public-space","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/2017\/austria-commemoration-of-jewish-holocaust-events-in-situ-gains-momentum-and-enhance-public-space\/","title":{"rendered":"Austria \/ Commemoration of Jewish Holocaust events in situ gains momentum and enhance public space"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Lately, inspiring projects can be seen across Austria, commemorating the fate of Jewish people during and following World War II. This is a refreshing change, as the Holocaust events in general and the life of Jewish people in Austria at that time in particular, were not common in the sociohistorical discourse in Austria. Such projects, located in public domain, add meaning to public areas threatened by technology mediated experiences.<\/p>\n<h3>Aspang former railway station &#8211; A silent memory to troubled times in a renewing area of Vienna<\/h3>\n<p>In September 2017, a memorial to the 47,035 Jewish men and women deported from Aspang Railway Station was inaugurated in\u00a0Leon Zelmann Park in Landstra\u00dfe, the 3rd municipal District of Vienna.\u00a0The Station was demolished in 1977, making space to a renewing residential area.<\/p>\nngg_shortcode_0_placeholder\nngg_shortcode_1_placeholder\n<p>The memorial was designed by the\u00a0artist duo <a href=\"http:\/\/www.prinz-pod.at\/\" target=\"_blank\">PRINZpod<\/a>, who won an artistic competition, and is located on the site of the former railway station.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/GbEwCGiW_JE?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>The project was funded and managed by the institution \u201e<a href=\"http:\/\/www.koer.or.at\/\" target=\"_blank\">K\u00d6R &#8211; Kunst im \u00f6ffentlichen Raum<\/a>\u201d (&#8220;Public Art Vienna&#8221;).\u00a0K\u00d6R is &#8220;committed to breathing new life into the city of Vienna\u2019s public space with permanent or temporary art projects&#8230; The projects have to be publicly accessible within the City of Vienna, where art can be experienced by everybody&#8230;\u00a0The public sphere should present itself as an accessible field in which democracy, opinion forming, and sociality can unfold their effects.&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>This approach is crucial in an era in which authentic urban experiences &#8211; from shopping to culture &#8211; are being replaced by mediated mundane actions done using technological devices at home.<\/p>\n<p>More info about this project\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.koer.or.at\/en\/projects\/mahnmal-aspangbahnhof\/\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>Vienna U-Bahn station &#8211; passing by you learn about those who passed away<\/h3>\n<p>Another project by\u00a0K\u00d6R is the art installation at Schottenring U2 subway station by the artist\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.michaelamelian.net\/\" target=\"_blank\">Michaela Meli\u00e1n<\/a>, opened in October 2017. Meli\u00e1n&#8217;s work is located in a tunnel leading to Herminengasse exit. It is dedicated to\u00a0800 Jewish residents of Herminengasse who were deported by the Nazis during WWII.\u00a0Meli\u00e1n conducted a research and identified 1322 Jewish people who lived on this street. Their residences are represented by black bars. On the edges, names of concentration camps are listed.\u00a0Each line between a building and a concentration camp\u00a0represents a story of one Jewish person.\u00a0Passing through the tunnel, one may follow the threads of life of these Jews.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/s8PeGaOJRA4?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>I passed by this station by chance on the day the project was inaugurated.\u00a0Meli\u00e1n was there with a group of local students, who caught my attention.<\/p>\nngg_shortcode_2_placeholder\nngg_shortcode_3_placeholder\n<p>More info about this project <a href=\"http:\/\/www.koer.or.at\/en\/projects\/herminengasse\/\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>Alpine Peace Crossing &#8211; re-creating a hike, promoting friendship and care for those on the flight<\/h3>\n<p>For 10 years, &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/alpinepeacecrossing.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Alpine Peace Crossing<\/a>&#8221; (APC) has been commemorating events related to Jewish people escape through Austrian land towards the Land of Israel following the Holocaust.\u00a0Dr. Ernst L\u00f6schner, founder of APC, discovered by chance a story about 5,000 Jews who crossed the 2,634m Krimmler Tauern mountain pass from Austria to Italy on their way to Israel. In summer 2007, the first &#8220;Alpine Peace Hike&#8221; took place, where hundreds of people, including Jewish survivors who crossed the pass in 1947, participated in a reenacting of the heroic cross. &#8220;Alpine Peace Hike&#8221; became an annual event, and the whole Krimml area is now familiar with the story &#8211; I myself heard about it from a local school headmaster whom I met while hiking in the mountains above Zell-am-See.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BplIur07wgc?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>Plaques in the form of pyramids now tell the 1947 story along the path across the Krimmler Tauern pass.<\/p>\nngg_shortcode_4_placeholder\n<p>Another\u00a0APC initiative was a commemoration site founded in &#8220;Givat Avoda&#8221; transition camp in the town of Saalfelden. Occasional commemoration ceremonies are held there, with the participation of Austrian army units that now use the camp.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/xda_6gQ8lkY?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>The commemoration at Saalfelden and Krimml tells one story of many about the activities of the &#8220;Briha&#8221; (&#8220;Flight&#8221;) underground Jewish organization, who worked for gathering Jewish refugees after the Holocaust. In October 2017, a grove with 49 trees was inaugurated in Hohe Tauern National Park, on the former path of the Jews, commemorating those who crossed the Krimml pass and those who have been assisting keeping the memory alive.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KWCN8zHh8hU?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>All these commemorative aspects get a form in public space, thus enabling people to stumble upon and learn about the historical events while passing by the area.<\/p>\n<h3>Interactive theater &#8211; bringing historical events to a higher level of authenticity in a deeply emotional way<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.teatro-caprile.at\/\" target=\"_blank\">Teatro Caprile<\/a> brought the commemoration to a higher level of authenticity by creating a &#8220;Walking Theater&#8221;, where actors play scenes of historical events, while the stage is the real places where these events took place, and the audience walks together with actors along the path of events.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Ins Gelobte Land &#8211; Eretz Austria&#8221; was presented in June 2017, telling the story of the Jewish flight over the 2,634m Krimmler Tauern pass in a highly emotional way.<\/p>\n<div class=\"kad-youtube-shortcode videofit\"  ><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/sB-ii40vKGQ?autoplay=0&controls=1&fs=1&modestbranding=0&theme=dark&rel=0&loop=0&showinfo=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>These projects, varied in scale and located in various types of places &#8211; from remote mountainous areas to bustling spots in Vienna, demonstrate a healthy process of Austrian society dealing with dreadful past events and bringing them to\u00a0real public domain on broad daylight, literally.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Inspiring projects across Austria commemorate the fate of Jewish people during and following World War II, refresh the sociohistorical discourse in Austria and add meaning to public areas threatened by technology mediated experiences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9837,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[100],"tags":[17,24,31,32,35,56],"class_list":["post-9155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","tag-art","tag-events","tag-hiking","tag-history","tag-judaism","tag-urban"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9155"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9845,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9155\/revisions\/9845"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/guyshachar.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}